


Wind His Branches Round

by frausorge



Series: Bad Weather Friend [2]
Category: Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance
Genre: 14valentines, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-02-02
Updated: 2009-02-02
Packaged: 2017-10-05 17:04:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/44004
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frausorge/pseuds/frausorge
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Mikey," Gerard said in his ear as they were leaving the stage, "hey, Mikey, I think you have a fan."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wind His Branches Round

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day 2 of 14valentines 2009. Many heartfelt thanks to Nicogrrl, imogenics, afterthefair, and thissugarcane for beta and support. Title from Pink Floyd. Loosely inspired by this interview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5a9cjkh9DU

"Mikey," Gerard said in his ear as they were leaving the stage, "hey, Mikey, I think you have a fan."

"What?" Mikey said.

Gerard jerked his chin at the VIP cordon. "This is the third time Wentz has come to watch you play."

Mikey looked, and sure enough there was the short, slim figure, the shock of dark hair and unsmiling eyes. He lifted his hand up, and Wentz waved briefly back before slipping away into the crowd.

"All that time staring at you," Gerard said as Mikey tugged the strap of his bass over his head, "and not even a 'hey, how's it going' afterwards? That is one shy little fucker."

"You're one to talk, motherfucker."

Gerard grinned. Then Ray came over to talk to him about adjustments to the sound levels, and Mikey escaped to the water jugs without having to say any more about whom or what Wentz was coming to see.   
   


Mikey was one to talk himself, of course. But the thing was, he never had much luck making eye contact when Fall Out Boy was onstage, no matter how many times he went to hear their sets. It didn't seem like the attitude of someone who was dying for Mikey to come over and start a conversation. Sometimes he thought he must have imagined the smiles he remembered from last summer.  
   


On one of the days that they were playing early, Mikey ran into Wentz in the breakfast line.

"Hi," Wentz said softly, looking up at him.

"Hi," Mikey tried to say back, except that in the middle of it he suddenly broke into an enormous yawn. "Oh my god, sorry. Hey."

Wentz's mouth curved into a smile. "Up late?"

"Yeah," Mikey said stupidly. "Or, I don't know. Not that late, really. Had kind of a hard time falling asleep."

"That sounds rough."

Mikey yawned again. "Maybe I'll take a nap this afternoon," he said, just to cap off the inanity of the conversation. Wentz was going to think he had never made it past kindergarten. But the look in Wentz's eyes was still sympathetic.

"Yeah, totally. I bet that would do you good."

Mikey drank some more coffee. "Hey," he said, since he seemed to be on a roll, "I'm gonna go and get ready for our set after this. You wanna come hang out or whatever?"

The smile he got in return was stunningly bright.

None of the other guys were around in the makeshift dressing room yet. Wentz sat on the table, back to the mirror, and watched while Mikey straightened his hair section by section and put on his eyeliner. They didn't talk a lot, but Wentz reached over once, hand hovering next to Mikey's ear, and said, "You missed some back here."

"Where?" Mikey said, craning his neck to try to see it in the mirror.

"Here," Wentz said, tugging gently on the loose strand, and Mikey felt his whole scalp tingle.

"Um, thanks," he said.  
   


Wentz showed up again two days later when Mikey had just started to fix his hair. "You want some company?" Wentz said, peering into the doorway.

"Always," Mikey said, and got another brilliant smile back.

After that Wentz started coming by without asking, whenever Fall Out Boy and My Chem weren't playing too close together. It was really nice having someone hang out.

Mikey tried going by the trailer when it was Fall Out Boy's turn to get ready, but Wentz and Trohman were hollering at each other nonstop over the warm-up riffs Stump was singing and the beats Hurley was pounding on his practice mats, and it didn't really look like they needed any more company. He wound up mostly just waiting for Wentz to come see him.  
   


Once, when Mikey had slept on his hair wrong and had to keep combing out and re-ironing the most stubborn strands, Wentz started poking around in Gerard's makeup box, which had been left sitting open on the counter. Mikey didn't pay much attention to the movement behind him until he gave up on his hair and turned to look for his own eye pencil.

"Are you - uh," he said.

"You guys have so much stuff," Wentz said, turning away from the mirror to face him. "I just thought it would be fun to fool around a little."

"Oh," Mikey said.

He could see mascara, and eyeliner, and eye shadow in a soft sweep that made Wentz's irises look even darker than usual. It wasn't slathered on the way Gerard and Frank did it, or eye-catchingly dramatic the way Sarah had always done hers. It looked subtler, more natural, like Wentz was just trying to look - _pretty_, Mikey guessed, was really the only word for it.

"What do you think?"

"Um," Mikey said. "It looks pretty decent, actually. You should keep it on for this afternoon."

"You think?"

"Sure," Mikey said, and then he hesitated, because it wasn't show makeup, not really. "Well, I guess maybe it's not dark enough to show up well on stage. But, like, for a photo shoot or something sometime, it'd be pretty cool."

The smile Wentz gave him was soft and a little wistful. "Yeah, maybe sometime. Could you pass me the cold cream?"   
   


"Wait, you never did D&amp;D at all?" Mikey said. "Not even, like, in high school?"

"Nope."

"What kind of geek _are_ you?"

"The cool kind, obviously!" Frank called down from the upper bunk. Mikey swung his leg up to kick at the ceiling of the bunk and switched the phone to his other ear.

"Sorry about that," he said. "There's this huge idiot who hangs around on our bus, we just try to ignore him usually. So what did you do in high school? Oh, you were a big soccer star, weren't you?"

There was a pause. "There was - yeah," Wentz said finally. "There was soccer, and stuff."

"Was that fun?" Mikey said after a moment.

"Actually, what I really liked was just going running."

"That's cool," Mikey said. "I'm not saying I understand it, as such. But it's cool." That drew a laugh, and Mikey relaxed some again. "Do you ever get to go for runs anymore?"

"Not so much on tour. But at home, sometimes."

"Sweet."

Wentz made an affirmative hum over the line and then said, "Hey, it's kind of late. I ought to let you go."

"Yeah, all right," Mikey said. "Sleep tight."

"Thanks. 'Night."

"Sleep tight, Ray," Bob said across the aisle after Mikey had hung up.

"Oh, you sleep tight too, Bob," Ray said.

"I'm surrounded by five-year-olds," Mikey said loudly. Then he rolled over and pulled his blanket up over his ears to block out the rest of the chatter. It took him a while to fall asleep.  
   


"Free day tomorrow," Wentz said.

"Fuck yeah," Mikey said.

"So I found out there's a water park, like, half a mile or a mile from the venue."

"Oh, there is?"

"Yeah. You know I went to one with the guys in the first week of tour and it was really awesome. Do you think - would you maybe wanna go? Tomorrow?"

"Okay," Mikey said. Maybe it wasn't the first thing he would have thought of himself, spending the day out in the sun, but- "Sure."

Wentz came over to the My Chem bus at noon the next day. Mikey kind of wanted to ask where the rest of Fall Out Boy was, but then he remembered that he hadn't invited the rest of his band either. He ended up not saying anything.

The day turned out gorgeous. The sun shone ferociously out of a clear sky, which would have been miserable on the buses, but felt perfect through soaked T-shirts. They chased each other down the slides and through the mazes, splashing and shrieking at the top of their lungs, and only stopped long enough to eat hot dogs and nachos and caramel corn before running back up the stairs again.

When the park closed at eight it was still completely light out. They wandered along the road till they found a burrito stand and then turned and headed back, taking huge bites and dripping sauce and grains of rice along the way. Mikey's clothes were drying a bit stiffly, his skin felt itchy and tight from chlorine and sunburn, and he could tell he was going to have some spectacular bruises the next day, but he felt good for all that, muscle-tired and happy.

They slowed down once they reached the landscaped area outside the venue. There was a tangle of paved paths twining through the grounds, and they turned onto one without discussion.

Wentz stopped on a little footbridge, and Mikey stopped too, peering down over the railing. There was no water in the gully at the moment, but the steepness of its sides showed that they must have been cut by a swift current.

"Mikey," Wentz said abruptly.

"Yeah," Mikey said.

There was another silence. Mikey waited.

"What would you say if I told you my name is Julia?"

Mikey looked at the face in front of him, the strong brows, dark eyes, full lips, and the hands twisted into each other. "Julia," he said, testing the sound against the look, and got a nod in reply. He felt like his mind was whirling, but the more they stared at each other, the more it felt like there might be a firm hold there somewhere to hang onto.

"I guess it suits you," he said finally.

Julia smiled. Mikey leaned forward and rested his elbows on the railing, and Julia did the same.

"So, uh." Mikey cut a glance sideways without turning his head. "You're - are you saying you're a girl?"

"Yeah," she said. "Well, _I_ am."

Mikey looked at her hesitantly, and Julia sighed. "The thing is," she said. "I only – I mean, I'm here talking to you right now, you know? But most of the time it's Pete. But I'm not Pete, and I'm not part of Pete. We're just all in here."

Mikey paused. "'All'?" he said.

Julia sighed again. "Me and Pete and Jason."

"Oh." Mikey's mind was spinning again.

"It's like," Julia said. "You have your body to yourself, you get to be there, all the time. But we have to take turns."

"Oh," Mikey said. "So, like, when your band is onstage playing..."

"That's Pete. Or sometimes Jason. I don't play, myself."

"And, um. When you've come over to hang out?"

"That was me."

Mikey nodded, trying to let it sink in. He looked out at the orange clouds and the yellow and pink ones, the shapes they made towering into the sky.

Julia stirred next to him, and when Mikey turned he saw she was biting her lip, eyes cast down at her clenched fingers. "Julia," he said. "Julia, hey. I mean, I don't know if I totally get it. But don't be scared of me."

She gave a derisive snort, but it still sounded kind of shaky. Mikey reached over and laid his arm around her shoulders. To his relief she leaned into him and let him pull her close.

More questions were crowding up in his head, but Julia was looking steadily up at the sky now, where the first few stars were appearing. Mikey opened his mouth and then closed it again silently.

The horizon turned from orange to yellow to gray.

"Cold?" Mikey said when he felt her shiver.

"A little," she admitted.

He lifted his arm, and when she stepped away he felt the cold all down his side. He took off his jacket and held it out to her a little awkwardly.

"Thanks," she said, slipping her arms into the sleeves. "I guess, uh, we should probably go in, though."

"Okay," he said.

"But Mikey," Julia said, turning back suddenly. "Listen, I told you all this because – well, because I wanted you to know. But you can't tell anyone, okay? We don't ever, people can't – if it gets out, the press would make the biggest fucking circus, and it would be awful, Pete would –I just-"

"I won't," Mikey said. "I won't say anything, I promise."

"Thank you," she said. There was just enough light left for him to make out the lines of her face.

"We really should go back," she said.

"Yeah," he said.  
   


He turned over in his bunk, thinking about Fall Out Boy's stage show, Pete doing spins and playing right through them - not the kind of playing Ray would nod at him for, but still playing - and head-butting Patrick in the shoulder. Gerard and Frank bouncing off each other, Frank screaming lyrics back when they first met him, the Eyeball parties, the bright-colored drinks Gabe used to buy him. The way Sarah laughed when she was drunk. Wentz - Julia - sitting next to him on the table and touching his hair, and on that thought Mikey flipped his pillow over and tried to go to sleep.  
   


Julia was standing sidestage again. Mikey caught her eye as they were playing the final chords of Helena, and then she turned and disappeared among the techs. Cortez stopped him with a question on his way offstage, and by the time Mikey got to the trailer the rest of the guys were leaving it again.

"Go on in, Way," Frank said, grinning. "You've got a visitor."

Mikey pushed the door open without answering, and Julia was there, standing on the far side of the room.

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do!" Frank yelled. Mikey shut the door firmly.

"Hi," Julia said.

"Hi," he said. He went over to the table she was leaning against, and she smiled at him a bit nervously.

"You tired?" she said.

"No," he said, though he was drenched in sweat and all his muscles were singing from exertion.

She reached up and brushed his bangs off his forehead, her fingers feather-light on his skin, and he got hard from one breath to the next.

"Julia," he said. She looked up at him, and he laid his palm against her face and kissed her. She kissed back immediately, her lips opening to his, hot and soft to his tongue, and he lost himself in her mouth.

Some time later she drew back a little and pressed her fingers to his lips. "Mikey," she said, her voice full of laughter. "Mikey, shit. I'm sorry, but they're gonna be waiting for Pete. I have to go."

"Sure, of course," Mikey said. He leaned forward and kissed her again.

"Mikey!" she said a minute later.

"Okay, okay," he said. He unwrapped his hands from her waist, and she wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. He shook his head to try to clear it, and still all he could see was her.

"When can I see you again?" he said. Julia laughed a little sharply.

"I don't know," she said.

"C'mon," Mikey said, "you know what I mean. When do you _want_ to see me again? Can I come by your bus tomorrow?"

"Sure," she said, grinning. "Try your luck."

"Okay," Mikey said. "Okay, I will."

After she left he went straight to the bus and rolled into his bunk. His mind was an absolute blank of white noise while he jerked off, and he saw stars when he came.  
   


Mikey knocked three times on the window of the Fall Out Boy bus. After a minute Pete opened the door, wearing only gray boxer briefs, yawning, and scratching under his armpit. He looked out at Mikey without saying anything.

"Hi," Mikey made himself say.

"Hey."

"Um. I was hoping to catch Julia."

Pete's eyes flickered, but his expression didn't change. "Sorry," he said.

"Could you maybe just, uh, tell her I came by?"

"No."

Mikey pressed his lips together. "Okay," he said. "Sorry to bother you."

He turned to go, but Pete reached out and caught him by the elbow before he could step away. "No, look, Way. I – can you come in here a minute?"

Mikey followed Pete up the steps and into the front lounge.

"I'm not trying to be an asshole, okay?" Pete said, leaning against the dinette bench. "I guess I kind of am being one, so sorry and shit. But what I mean is, I can't tell Julia anything, for you or anyone else. I don't see her. I can't talk to her."

"Oh," Mikey said.

"You can – if you want to write her a note, I'll leave it where she'll see it. Or you can tell Joe or Andy or Patrick, and they'll tell her when they see her."

"Right," Mikey said. "Okay." He dug in his pocket and found part of an old setlist. Pete handed him a pen, and he bit his lip and wrote, _Hi Julia, just wanted you to know I stopped by. Hope to see you later. M._

He handed the paper to Pete, and Pete ripped off a piece of duct tape from the roll on the counter and went into the bunks. Mikey stood where he was, not quite wanting either to follow or leave. Luckily Pete came back quickly.

"So, like. Whatever, she'll probably call you, or just come back and try again, okay?" he said.

"Sure," Mikey said. He sketched out an awkward farewell wave and left.  
   


His phone rang while he was throwing away his plate after dinner, and it took him a minute to dig the phone out of his pocket. "Hello?" he said.

"Hi Mikey," Julia said, sounding a little breathless. "Um. This is Julia."

"Hi, you," Mikey said.

"So, I'm here on our bus now," Julia said, "if you wanted to come over."

"I'll be right there," Mikey said.  
   


"Hey, c'mon in," Trohman told him. "She's waiting for you."

"Thanks," Mikey said.

When he opened the door of the back lounge Julia turned and looked up at him. "You did your eyes," Mikey blurted out. She smiled.

"Yup," she said. "I did."

"I mean, hi," Mikey said. Julia's own colors looked even better on her than Gerard's had. He bent down and kissed her, and some of her lip gloss slicked onto his mouth, too. "It looks good. _You_ look good."

"Thanks," she said. She pulled him down onto the bench next to her and kissed him again.  
   


"Okay," Julia said, pulling away and giggling a little. "Okay, I'm officially kicking you out now. There are shows tomorrow, and everybody needs to sleep."

"Right," Mikey said. He drew back enough to see her face and her gorgeous smile. She laughed, dove forward to kiss him again, and then smacked him on the shoulder.

"Out!"

"All right, all right, I'm going," Mikey said.

When he jerked off back in his own bus, he kept replaying her soft lips on his face, his jaw, his throat, and he was gone within a minute.  
   


Mikey never saw Julia with her makeup on outside her own bus. But he could still see how she ought to look, even when he saw her without it, even when she still had Pete's eyeliner caked on. And she was always beautiful.  
   


"Can I ask you something?" Mikey said. Julia narrowed her eyes, but nodded. "What's it like for you when you're not here?"

"It's not like anything," she said. "I'm just not - it's like being asleep. When I wake up, it's like waking up from being asleep."

"Oh," Mikey said.

"I mean, I guess -" she added, wrinkling her forehead, "- sometimes I can already hear some stuff right before, like if people are talking, or if there's music playing really loud. But that's not very often."

Mikey thought about that for a minute and then said, "Can you tell, when you wake up, if you were really asleep, or if Pete or Jason was awake before?"

Julia pursed her lips. "It doesn't really feel any different," she said. "But I can usually tell. You know, from where I am, and who's around, and stuff."

"Oh, yeah," Mikey said.

"Honestly, between the three of us, I sometimes think we don't get that much actual sleep."

"That sucks," he said.

"Yeah," she said, "well."  
   


Mikey tucked two fingers under the hem of Julia's T-shirt, against the smooth skin of her hip. "Can I take this off?" he said.

"Yes," she said, ducking her head, and he had to kiss her again first.

Under the shirt she had on a bright red cotton bra. Mikey traced a finger slowly along the top hem of the cups, just barely brushing her skin. "This is pretty," he said.

"Thanks!" Julia said. "My mom just sent it to me."

Mikey couldn't help it, he giggled out loud. "That's awesome," he said. "But can we not talk about your mom any more right now?"

Julia laughed too. "Sure. What do you want to talk about?"

Mikey put one hand on her jaw and kissed her. He laid his other hand against the soft cotton and drew his thumb back and forth till he could clearly feel the shape of her nipple beneath. On the next sweep he hooked his thumb under the edge of the fabric and tugged it slowly aside. Then he touched skin to skin and listened to her breathing catch and shudder.

When he couldn't stand it anymore he shifted back and down, pressed his tongue against her, wrapped his lips around her nipple and sucked hard. She gasped and sank both hands into his hair to hold him there.  
   


"It's been a while since I've done this with a guy," she said a little later.

"I, um," Mikey said. "I don't think you have to worry." She looked up at him sharply, though her hand kept moving, and he tried to explain. "I mean – fuck! – I'm pretty sure I'm gonna like whatever you do."

"Well, okay then," she said, and bent her head down.

What she did, he found, was make his brain blank out and his eyes roll back in his head. He came in helpless gasps and found her smirking at him when he could focus again. "C'mere," he said.

Julia moved up and kissed him, but then she drew away again and laid her hand on his cheek. "I'm really sorry," she said, "but I have to send you back to your own bus. They're having a call with Crush tonight, and Patrick told me Pete has to be on it."

"But you -" Mikey said.

Julia shook her head. "Next time," she said, moving his hands off her hips, and he had to be content with that.  
   


The TV kept cycling through the menu of the movie they'd been watching until Mikey finally got distracted enough to reach past Julia and find the remote. She bent forward a little to avoid blocking the signal, then leaned back against his chest once he'd managed to hit off.

He tossed the remote to the other end of the bench and curved his palm over her thigh. "Hi," he said in her ear, rubbing at the worn denim of her jeans. "You feel like taking these off?"

"Oh, um," she said.

She was biting her lip, but still smiling, so he kissed her cheek and said, "'Um'?"

"Oh, it's so stupid," she said. "I mean, I want to. It's just, I really wish I could shave my legs. But I think Pete would kill me."

Mikey froze. Julia turned her head, trying to see his face. "What," she murmured.

"Can he, uh." Mikey swallowed. "Can he do that?"

Julia paused. "Not without killing himself."

They looked at each other.

Mikey took a deep breath. "Anyway," he said, "anyway, you're not the first girl I've dated who didn't shave."

"Well, good for you, Mr. Experience," she said. But her voice sounded subdued, and he tugged at her to lean back against him again without saying anything more. She rested her head on his shoulder, and he wrapped his arms around her waist as tightly as he could.  
   


"Hey, Mikey," Pete said. "Come in, dude. How's it going?"

"Not bad," Mikey said. "Uh. I could come back later?"

Pete shrugged. "It's cool. I was just about to start a new round of GTA, you wanna play?"

"Sure, okay," Mikey said.

He meant to just play a few minutes to be polite, but he got sucked in and ended up staying nearly two hours. Pete kept chattering the whole time, and his side comments were about ten times more disgusting than the game itself. Mikey had to fight to stop laughing long enough to keep track of what he was doing.  
   


Ray and Gerard were holed up in the back working on a song when Mikey went to bed, and they were still in there when he got up in the morning. Their voices sounded calm through the door, though, like they were really working and not just arguing, so he let them be and went up front instead.

"Coffee coffee coffee," Frank said when he came in. Mikey hunched protectively over his own mug. Frank poked him.

"Take your friggin' bagel out of the toaster, Mikeyway," he said. Mikey flapped a hand dismissively in Frank's direction and drank a little more of his coffee. Frank poked him again, and again, and again.

"Leave the space cadet alone," Bob said. "He's got other things on his mind right now."

Mikey put the mug down so he could use both hands to flip the two of them off. The only effect of this was that they immediately cracked up. Within a few seconds Mikey was cackling too.  
   


Andy and Patrick had commandeered their back lounge, so Julia and Mikey curled up together in her bunk.

"Which of these are yours?" Mikey said, tracing a finger over the tattoos on Julia's arm. She wrinkled up her nose and shook her head.

"They're mostly Jason's," she said. "At least, that's what Mom told me. But I'm actually not really into tattoos."

"Oh, okay," Mikey said. He switched to just following the line of her arm itself instead. She twitched a little and smiled sheepishly.

"Tickles," she said.

Mikey took his fingers away and pressed a kiss to the inside of her elbow. She grinned at him. He worked his way up her arm and across her shoulder and neck before finally moving back to her mouth.

"Tell your driver you're riding with us tonight," Julia murmured.

"Okay," he whispered back.

After he hung up he texted Gerard too, just to be on the safe side, and then he shoved the phone back into his pocket. Julia tugged on the pocket's top hem.

"Off," she said.

Mikey wiggled out of his jeans, and Julia scrunched down far enough in the bunk to get her mouth on his dick. She was even more amazing than he'd remembered.

He kissed her for a while again afterwards, soft brushes of their lips that he kept deliberately lighter than her eagerness demanded. Then he licked both thumbs, one after the other, and began rubbing them over her nipples.

"I wanna get you off," he said in her ear.

Julia drew in a hissing breath and let it out again. Then she opened her legs.

"Use your fingers," she said, "and your tongue." And Mikey did.  
   


"Mikey," someone said in his ear. "Mikey," and there was a hand gently shaking his shoulder. Mikey opened his eyes and saw Pete lying next to him. He blinked a couple of times.

"Pete," he said, and was suddenly intensely grateful that Julia had passed him his boxers and slipped her T-shirt back on before they fell asleep.

Pete gave him a lopsided smile. "Hey man, sorry to wake you, but I need to get out."

"Right," Mikey said. "'Course." He rolled over and slid out of the bunk, feeling for the floor with his toes, and Pete followed. Mikey tried to focus on the tangle of sheets and clothes at the foot of the bunk. "I'll, uh, I'll just get dressed and then I'll be out of your way."

"What?" Pete said, pausing at the bathroom door. "No, dude, I'm not kicking you out. Stick around, have some breakfast. Or go back to sleep if you want."

Mikey could have slept for another ten hours, but he felt weird climbing back into the bunk without Julia. He dragged his jeans and shirt out of the pile and wandered into the front lounge.

"Morning," Joe said. He held out a cereal box, and Mikey accepted it with a nod. He found a bowl and a spoon in the cupboards and decent-smelling milk in the fridge, and sat down on the opposite bench to eat.

Joe was a much more peaceful breakfaster than Frank.

Eventually Pete came out in a fresh T-shirt and sat down next to Joe. "Scorcher today," he said. Joe and Mikey nodded.

Mikey was drinking the last of the milk from his bowl when Patrick appeared from the bunks. "Pete?" Patrick said.

"Yeah?" Pete said.

"Ah," Patrick said. "Um, morning."

"I should get going," Mikey said. "I'll see you guys later."

Pete smiled. "Later, dude," he said.  
   


"You've been spending a lot of time with Wentz lately," Gerard said.

Mikey nodded.

"You giving dick another try?"

Mikey pursed up his mouth. "No," he said. "It's not like that."

"Yeah?" Gerard said, smiling not unkindly. "So you're, what, trading bass playing tips with him all night?"

"I -" Mikey said. "Sh- Wentz - look, it's just not like that."

"Okay," Gerard said. "Hey, don't be mad, Mikey, I was just teasing."

"Yeah, I know," Mikey said. He got up and poured himself another cup of coffee.  
   


"Julia," Mikey said. "Julia, baby, I want to tell my brother about you. Can I do that?"

She turned an unhappy face towards him.

"You promised, Mikey," she said. "You know, you know why, and you promised-"

"I know," he said. "And I haven't, I swear. Just – I usually tell Gee everything important, you know? It feels weird not talking to him about you."

He looked back up at her, and her eyes had gone soft and shiny.

"Okay," she whispered. "Okay, if you trust him. Just Gerard."

Mikey kissed her cheeks and her lips and her wet lashes, and she rolled him onto his back and stuck her tongue down his throat.  
   


Gerard was sleeping on the front couch, quiet and breathing steadily like he wasn't dreaming. He hadn't been getting much sleep at night, lately. Mikey decided not to wake him.  
   


Frank and Worm organized a kickball game that began at sunset and lasted well past midnight. Mikey was limping a little when he came back to the bus, not from kicking but from getting tackled.

"You want some coffee?" Gerard said.

Mikey groaned. "I think I'm just gonna crash," he said. Gerard laughed.  
   


"Dude, check this out," Pete said. "We just got a new shipment. What do you think?"

Mikey looked at the shirt Pete was holding up, black with blood-red rays pouring out of Pete's crazy bat. "That's pretty sweet," he said.

"Isn't it? I love how this one came out." Pete held the shirt away from himself so he could look at the pattern too, then started folding it back up. "Oh, hey, you want to take one? It kind of goes with you guys' look."

"I guess it does," Mikey said. "Cool, thanks."  
   


"Gerard, can I talk to you?" Mikey said after dinner.

"Let's go outside," Gerard said.

They wound around between the buses till they reached a patch of grass behind some deserted picnic tables. Gerard threw himself down flat on his back on the ground, and Mikey stretched out next to him, the way they used to in the basement at home. Mikey opened his mouth, and no words came.

Gerard turned his head and looked over. "What's going on, Mikey?"

"You, uh, you know that I'm dating someone," Mikey said finally.

"Well, yeah," Gerard said. "You and Pete have been kind of hard to miss."

"No," Mikey said. "That's what I wanted to tell you. It's not Pete."

"Not... what?" Gerard said.

Mikey stared up at the dark sky and the paler clouds moving across it. "She's a girl called Julia."

"Julia," Gerard echoed.

"Yeah," Mikey said. "Mostly nobody's supposed to know about her, but she said I could tell you." The ground was dry and dusty under his flattened palms. "Um, that's pretty much it," he said after a moment.

"Hang on," Gerard said. "Pete is really a girl?"

"No," Mikey said. "Pete is Pete. Julia's –" He tried to remember how she'd put it. "She's just also in there. In the same body. They, like, share."

Gerard was quiet for a minute. "It sounds complicated, Mikey," he said.

"She's really amazing," Mikey said.

"You really like her, huh?"

"Yeah," Mikey said. "Yeah, I really do."

Gerard reached over and ruffled Mikey's hair. Mikey huffed out a snort but didn't try to evade Gerard's hand. They went on lying there till their phones began to ring, one after the other, with Brian's tone.  
   


Mikey called Julia to say good night, and she was giggling when she picked up. "Hi, baby," she said.

He laughed a little himself, hearing it. "Julia," he said, "are you tipsy right now?"

"Mm," she said. "Yeah, maybe. I think Jason might have been drinking earlier."

"Oh," Mikey said.

"I'm starting to sober up now, though," she added quickly.

"Ah, yeah," Mikey said.

"How'd your set go?" she asked, and he settled in to tell her.  
   


"So," Frank said, "how are things in the Fall Out Lovenest? Is Pete treating you right? You wearing him out yet?"

Mikey rolled his eyes at the TV screen and took another sip of coffee.

"Yeah, Mikey," Gerard said, "how's your little girlfriend?"

Mikey lowered his mug and turned square around, and Gerard gave him a totally Gerard-ish, unsubtle wink. Behind Gerard Ray was grinning, Bob was snickering, and Frank whooped. Mikey stared back at Gerard, at this one guy out of all the world who was his brother.

"She's fine," Mikey said after a moment, and the word felt light and free on his tongue.

"You better treat your lady right, Mikeyway!" Frank sang out

"Uh huh," Mikey said. He lifted the mug and blew carefully over the top of the coffee.  
   


Julia looked up from her laptop with flashing eyes. "What the hell, Mikey? You started a fucking _gang_ with Pete?" she said, and her voice was almost shaking.

"No," Mikey said. "No, come on. You know it's just Pete's way of talking."

"Seems like you'd have to be pretty cozy for him to talk like that."

"Julia," Mikey said.

She took a deep breath and flattened her hands on her thighs. "Okay," she said. "Okay, I'm sorry. I guess I just sometimes wish I could keep you all to myself."

"Pete's a friend," Mikey said carefully. "He's funny to hang out with, and he's got interesting ideas. But I don't want anyone but you."

"Oh, Mikey," Julia said. She set the laptop aside and leaned up to kiss him, more gently than usual. He wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and kissed back till it changed from making up into plain old making out.  
   


"Tomorrow's a hotel night," Mikey said.

"Mm," Julia said thoughtfully.

"I asked Brian to get me a single."

"Hm," she said, nodding with studied innocence.

Mikey rolled his eyes. "Do you want to spend the night with me and have sex?"

"Yeah," Julia said, finally cracking a grin, "I really do." She leaned up and kissed him hard. _Tomorrow,_ Mikey had to tell himself sternly before he could make himself let go of her hips and step back.

"I think they put us in a different motel than you guys," Julia said. "But I'll let Joe know that I'm staying over with you. Come pick me up before you head out, okay?"

"Cool," Mikey said. He shoved his hands into his hoodie pockets and willed his dick to calm down.  
   


When Mikey knocked on the bus door it was Pete who answered.

"Pete," Mikey said. "Hi."

"Hey, c'mon in," Pete said.

Mikey followed Pete into the front lounge. He couldn't think of anything to say.

"I'm not who you wanted to see tonight, huh?" Pete said. "Joe told me you were gonna be coming by, that you and Julia had plans."

"Well," Mikey said. "Yeah, I mean. We did. But."

Pete slouched back into the corner of the couch and tapped his fingers against his thigh.

"I was actually trying to let go just now," he said. "But I guess it didn't take."

"You can do that?" Mikey said.

Pete tilted his hand back and forth, palm up, palm down. "Sometimes," he said. "I'm not usually trying to."

Mikey bit his lip.

"Listen," Pete said after another minute, "she was probably nervous, or whatever. But I bet if we just go ahead and take off, she'll turn up before long."

"Uh," Mikey said. "And if she doesn't?"

"Then you're buying me an extra-large pizza, and I get the remote," Pete said. Mikey laughed in spite of himself, though it came out a little more high-pitched than usual. "I'll grab the bag. I think she already packed her stuff."

"Okay," Mikey said.

Pete made sure the bus door was locked and then followed Mikey out to where the cab was waiting.

"Oh my god, stuffy," Pete said when they got in. "How can you stand to drive in this, dude? Can we open the windows?"

"Knock yourselves out," the cabbie said. Pete punched at the button on his side till the window slid down as far as it would go, and then he leaned across Mikey to do the same for the other one.

"That's better," he said when the car started moving. The air outside didn't seem much cooler to Mikey, but even the small breeze that flowed through the back seat felt good.

Pete looked out his window, and Mikey glanced out his.

"Seriously," Mikey said after a few more blocks, "this isn't weirding you out?"

Pete turned to look at him. "Yeah, dude, it's weird. Unlike, y'know, the rest of my life."

"I just," Mikey said. "I mean, I'm not sorry for being with Julia. But I don't want to make things harder for you."

Pete glanced away and shrugged. "Joe says you're good for her... She deserves to catch a break for once. God knows she doesn't have it easy."

"It doesn't sound like any of you do," Mikey said.

Pete shrugged again and turned back to the window.

Mikey watched the people on the sidewalks and the streetlights and the neon signs rush past them. After a while the colors seemed to swirl together like a kaleidoscope.

"Mikey," Julia said.

He snapped his head around and found her smiling at him.

"Hi, you," he said.

"Hi," she said. He touched the back of her hand briefly and then pulled his fingers back. They grinned at each other till the cab pulled up in front of the motel.  
   


In the room, Julia pulled her makeup case out of her duffel bag. Then she shoved it back in, picked up the whole bag, and went into the bathroom. "I'm gonna take a shower," she said. "I'll be right out."

Mikey sat on the edge of the bed to undo his boots, and then he pulled his socks off as well. He opened his own bag and rummaged around in it a bit. He drank some water out of a bottle he found in there, but regretted it when he tasted the plasticky taint it left behind. He lay down on the bed, then sat up and yanked off his T-shirt and lay down again. Then he scooted up to sit leaning against the headboard.

When Julia came out of the bathroom Mikey could only stare. Her makeup looked darker than what she wore for everyday, still applied with a light touch, but more smoky, more shadowy, more sultry. She had on a silky black slip and thigh-high black stockings, and she was absolutely stunning.

"God, you're beautiful," he said.

Julia smiled and came over to the bed. "How about you take those off?" she said, nodding at his jeans. He got out of them and his boxers as fast as he could and tossed them into the corner. Then she moved up with a knee on either side of his thighs and kissed him. He ran his hands over her collarbones, down her sides, across her hips, and then settled his palms on the curve of her ass. She shimmied a little against him and kissed just the corner of his lips.

Mikey skimmed one hand down to Julia's knee and back up again. He slipped two fingers inside the band at the top of her stocking, and underneath it her skin was perfectly smooth.

"Hey," he said.

Julia grinned and raised an eyebrow at him.

"Wow," he said. "Hey, sit back a little?"

She shifted to sit between his legs, leaning back on her palms. He put his hand under her ankle and drew her leg up straight, kissed her calf and the back of her knee and her thigh, then pulled the stocking slowly down and ran his tongue down after it. She kept watching him keenly, even when he felt her leg tremble.  
   


He slid his hand under the hem of her slip, up the inside of her thigh and between her legs, feeling the glide of her slickness on his fingers.

"You're so wet for me," he said in her ear, and she sighed out a long breath.

"Yes."   
   


He rolled them both over and couldn't help gasping at the feeling of her body pressed underneath him. She lifted one leg and wrapped it around him to pull his hips even closer to her belly.

"Fuck me," she said, low, and he groaned.

"Yeah," he said, "yeah."  
   


He woke in the gray light of dawn and realized that the mattress was shifting because Julia was rolling away and getting up. She turned back and touched his outstretched hand. "Shh, sleep more," she whispered. He watched, still sleep-dazed, while she picked up her phone and walked over to the bathroom.

"Mom, it's me, Julia!" he heard her say. Then the door closed behind her, and he fell back into sleep.  
   


The light was stronger and Julia was back in bed, asleep next to him, when he woke up for real. He touched her shoulder, and she opened her eyes and smiled at him.

"Hi," he said.

"Morning," she said, and he kissed her soft mouth. They kissed some more in the shower, and while they were getting dressed, and then once more before they opened the door of the room and went out to catch a cab back to the buses.  
   


"How's that girl of yours?" Frank yelled, and Mikey rolled his eyes.

"She's fine," he said.  
   


Mikey arrived at the Fall Out Boy bus just as Andy was leaving. "Oh hey man, go on in," Andy said, holding the door open.

"Thanks," Mikey said.

When he came past the driver's seat, though, he wasn't sure who was sitting at the table. "Hi," Mikey said. "Um, Andy let me in."

"Well, hello," the guy said, turning, and Mikey thought, _Jason_.

"I was just looking for Julia," he said.

"She's not around," Jason said. He tilted his head to the side and looked Mikey up and down. "But I'd be happy to keep you company if you want to wait."

"No thanks," Mikey said. "I'll just try and catch her later."

"Come by anytime!" Jason called after him. Mikey walked faster.  
   


Bob came into the trailer where they were setting up to rehearse and pointed a finger straight at Mikey. "Dudes," Bob said, "do not ever lose a bet to Mikey Way."

"Why?" Ray said. "What happened?"

"Pete said Mikey won one off him, and Mikey made him shave his legs to pay up."

"Oh man, that's cold," Cortez said, laughing.

"Pete didn't -" Mikey said. "I mean, I didn't _make_-" He broke off again. "It wasn't my idea," he said finally.

"Oh sure," Bob said, "you had nothing to do with it."

Mikey looked out at the bit of blue sky he could see outside the trailer. "I didn't ask for it," he said.

"Hey, how about we get started," Ray said. "There's some parts of Cemetery Drive we need to clean up, we can work on that till Frank and Gerard get here."

"Sure," Bob said. Cortez handed Mikey his bass and slapped him on the shoulder.  
   


When Mikey finally managed to catch Julia again, she was in a terrible mood.

"So, you're wearing Pete's shirt now?" she snapped.

Mikey tugged out the hem of the shirt and looked down at the bat. "This wasn't his," he said. "It was a new one."

"New, old," she said. "I can't believe he's giving you presents."

"It's not fucking like that, and you know it." Mikey closed his eyes for a second and made himself relax his shoulders. "Look, we talked about this. He's been pretty chill about me being with you, a lot more than I would have expected. So don't give me a hard time for just being friends with him."

"Fine," Julia said. She took a quick breath, as if she were going to say something else, but let it out again silently and leaned her head on Mikey's shoulder instead.  
   


After his set he found Julia waiting for him. She kissed him and said, "Can you ride with us tonight?"

"Sure," he said.

When he got to her bus she opened the door herself and led him past Patrick and Joe, who barely looked up from Patrick's laptop, to the bunks.

"Hi," Julia said when Mikey had climbed in after her.

"Hi," he said. He kissed the corner of her mouth, and she smiled and brushed his bangs back from his face. He kissed her again, and she kissed back sweetly, easily, resting her hand on his shoulder. He began to relax a little, till he could feel the fatigue in his muscles. Julia took his glasses off and kissed the bridge of his nose. He laughed and pulled her closer, and they went on trading kisses till they fell asleep.  
   


"How's your girl, Mikey?" Ray said, and there wasn't a hint of teasing in his voice. Mikey looked up and stared at Ray's face. Ray looked steadily back at him.

"She's doing all right," Mikey said at last.

"Cool," Ray said, and picked up his headphones.  
   


Mikey stayed over again and woke up in the middle of the night with Julia's body shaking against him.

"Julia?" he whispered. She sniffed hard, and he touched her cheek and found it wet.

"I hate this!" she hissed. "I hate it, god, it sucks so fucking much. The tour's gonna end soon, and everything's gonna change, and I'll still never get to change anything real."

"Like what?" Mikey said.

Julia lifted a hand and waved vaguely down at herself.

Mikey stroked her hair a few times. "Maybe," he said after a minute, "there's some stuff that you could do? I mean, Pete did get over it when you shaved your legs."

Julia reached down and laid her hand on Mikey's dick. "You think he'll get over this?" she said. Mikey couldn't help the shudder that went through him.

"Yeah," she said. "And if I did, if I just said screw you, fuck you, and just fucking did it - if I could even get it done - how much you wanna bet he or Jason would kill us all for real? _God,_" she was almost choking now, "I hate my fucking life!"

Mikey pressed his palm gingerly against her back. She hid her face in his shoulder.

"Julia," he said into her hair.

She stilled gradually without saying anything else, and after a while he hoped she might have fallen asleep. He went on lying there staring open-eyed into the dark.  
   


Gerard was rampaging up and down the stage like a madman, and Mikey got into it too, playing as hard and as fast as he could. Frank came over and dueled opposite him for a bit before wheeling away again. Sweat was stinging in Mikey's eyes and he barely had time to wipe it away between songs.

"Good show," Ray said afterwards.

"Yeah, that was fun," Gerard said. He slung his arm around Mikey's shoulders. "Hey, you wanna watch Dawn of the Dead tonight?"

"Original or remake?" Mikey said.

"You pick," Gerard said. He scrubbed his hand through Mikey's hair.

"Quit it," Mikey said, ducking away. "Remake, then."

"Remake it is."  
   


Gerard kicked Mikey in the ribs about halfway through.

"Ow! What the fuck, cut that shit out, Gee," Mikey said.

"No brooding during the movie," Gerard said.

Mikey looked up at him. "Pass the chips," he said. When Gerard did, Mikey took one out and threw it at him. Gerard laughed.  
   


"Mikey," Julia said, and he could already tell from her face that what was coming wasn't going to be anything good. "We have to talk about what's going to happen when the tour ends."

She tugged on his hand, and he sat down across from her reluctantly.

"I'll call you a lot," he said, trying to keep his voice even. "We'll figure out when our breaks are, I'll come see you in Chicago, or maybe you could come to Jersey sometime-" But she was shaking her head.

"Mikey, no, listen. I've had more face time this summer than ever before, and I know it's because of you. You bring me out like nothing else ever has. And it's been so awesome. But-" She sighed and pressed her fingertips to her temple. "When this tour is over, and you're not around every day anymore, I won't be, either."

"Julia," Mikey said. She shook her head again.

"It wouldn't just be a long-distance relationship, do you see? You could call every day, fly out to visit during every break, and still go weeks, months - fuck, even years - without catching me. I don't want that for you-"

"Julia!" Mikey tried again, but she pressed on, raising her voice over his.

"-no, Mikey, it would suck, you know it would. You'd get tired of having a girlfriend you couldn't even talk to, you'd get resentful, and you'd have a right to be. You deserve more than that. You -" She swallowed hard. "I want you to be able to be with someone who can give you that."

"Julia," he choked out.

"And every time I woke up," she said harshly, "I'd be wondering how long I'd made you wait this time, and I'd feel guilty about it. And then I'd be mad about feeling guilty over something I can't control. And I don't want that for me."

"Okay," Mikey said. "Okay, shit, stop. I get it."

He stood up and scrubbed the back of his hand over his nose. His hoodie was crammed in under a backpack on the floor. He leaned down to disentangle it and pull it on. "I'm - I'm gonna go. I have to meet up with the guys soon anyway."

"Are you coming back here tonight?" Julia said in a small voice.

"Are you?" he said, and watched her crumple. "Fuck!" he said as soon as her face changed. "Motherfuck, I'm sorry, that was a shitty thing to say. I will, okay? I'll come over after dinner. I just - need to go for a walk right now."

"Okay," she said.

He bent down to brush his lips across hers and headed for the front of the bus. Behind him he heard the beeps of her phone keys.

"Mom, it's Julia," he heard her say, and her voice was thick with tears.  
   


In the evening Joe let him onto the bus with a somewhat suspicious expression. Mikey gave Joe a helpless shrug, and Joe waved him on towards the back, where he found Julia already lying in her bunk.

"Hey," Mikey said softly.

"Hi," Julia said. "Can we just go to sleep?"

"Yeah," Mikey said. He took off his jeans, stuffed them down towards the foot of the bunk, and got in, pressing himself against Julia's back and wrapping his arm over her waist. She turned her face briefly towards him for a kiss and then turned away again.

It was still early, and Mikey had expected another long night of lying awake. But he was asleep before he knew it.  
   


In the days after that they spent most of their time curled up on the couch together without talking. Mikey was trying not to sulk, and he thought Julia was too, but there just didn't seem to be much to say anymore. So they ended up mostly just watching a lot of movies and making out.

There was one more hotel night, and they made full use of it to fuck at length and leisure. Mikey kissed Julia's throat as she arched up under him, and she was still the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen.

"You could still call me, you know," he said afterwards, when they were lying on the same pillow. "Or text me, or whatever. Even if we're not together. Just to let me know how you're doing, sometimes."

Julia ran her fingers along his cheekbone. "Maybe," she said. "Maybe."  
   


On the last day of tour they had planned to sleep in, but Mikey found himself opening his eyes long before he meant to. When he leaned up to look at Julia's face he saw that she was awake, too. He kissed her and tried to smile. "Morning," he said. "Wanna get up and have breakfast?"

"Okay," she said. "You can go first."

When Mikey came out of the bathroom, Julia was waiting for him in the aisle, already dressed in jeans and her favorite black hoodie. She put her arms around his neck and kissed him thoroughly.

"You'll hear from me, okay?" she said. "Don't wait for me, I'll just call you when I can. And you can get in touch too, if you want. But I want to say goodbye to you now." She leaned up and kissed him once more. Then she stepped back, swept her gaze down to his feet, and closed her eyes.

"Wait!" Mikey said. Pete blinked up at him.

"Hey, Mikey," Pete said, looking faintly surprised. Mikey squared his shoulders and tugged on the sleeve of the black hoodie.

"Take this off," he said.

Pete stiffened and pulled away. "Mikey," he said sharply.

"No," Mikey said. "Pete, no, I know it's you. I just - please."

"The hell," Pete said, but he didn't look angry anymore, just wary. He kept his eyes on Mikey's face, and after another minute he pulled down the zipper of the hoodie and shrugged out of the sleeves.

Mikey grabbed Julia's lipstick out of the bunk and uncapped it. Then he took Pete by the wrist and wrote _goodbye_ in glistening dark red letters across all the tattoos on Pete's forearm.

"Leave it till she sees it," he said.

Pete nodded. Mikey dropped the lipstick on the floor, pushed through the doors, and stumbled off the bus into the blinding sunlight.


End file.
